


The way I should go

by OracleOfTheEnd



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Genre: M/M, Reunions, Sad with a Happy Ending, post-dsod
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-07
Updated: 2017-06-07
Packaged: 2018-11-10 07:04:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11122248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OracleOfTheEnd/pseuds/OracleOfTheEnd
Summary: Kaiba does not know for long he has wandered through the desert. The only thing that matters is reaching him.





	The way I should go

Kaiba does not know for long he has wandered through the desert when he finally reaches the outskirts of the city. The palace is a constant mirage in the sky, mocking and drawing him closer at the same time.

 

His body aches, heavy like lead, but he refuses to slow down to catch his breath. It is irrelevant now, he tells himself stubbornly. The only thing that matters is reaching _him._

The streets flicker in the unrelenting heat of this afterlife’s sun as he passes by hundreds of people. They go about their life without even looking at the strange man in their midst.

 

He wonders if they know that they are dead and for one horrible moment he wonders if _Atem_ knows he’s dead or if he has simply forgotten his time in the present, shed it like a snake might shed his skin. Blended back into his time as seamlessly as a piece of that damned puzzle.

 

_No, not possible. It cannot._

 

The guards do not regard him as he climbs the stairs to the palace with its open doors and the inviting shadows that lay beyond. His body aches even more now but he still thinks they could not keep him out even if they tried to. He sacrificed too much, got too far to be stopped here.

 

A familiarity grips him as he enters the cool building, like he has walked through its halls a thousand times before. Like a ghost he wanders, never faltering, until he finally finds the room he was looking for all along.

 

That pain sears through him again. He looks down at his hands, sees them evaporating with every passing second, but thinks of the way they used to hold his pharaoh in a different life. The way they twirled him in a private dance, hidden in bedchambers privy only to themselves.

 

The way Atem had smiled up at him, full of love. He is not smiling now, sitting on his golden throne like a statue. His eyes hold a sadness a thousand years too old for his face.

 

When he finally gets up from his seat it is with a sort of accepting finality, the way a man gets up to face the inevitable executioner‘s block.

 

Atem makes his way down the steps leading up to his throne, motions as flawless and graceful as one might be expecting from a god turned flesh. Such a stark contrast to his own sluggish movements. He resents his own weakness in this moment. He wants to hold his head up high, bark out a challenge before his rival even reaches him, but it is too hard.

 

His bones ache with a pain that is not solely his own. The pain of a lifetime waiting. He feels the priest in his soul stronger than ever, ready to rest now that he reached his goal, but Kaiba denies him. He is still himself, and this is his moment. This is what he had worked for, what he had given up everything for.

 

He needs a moment to register that Atem is now in front of him, reaching for his face with trembling fingers. That is not right, he thinks. Atem is never trembling, never afraid. He wants to pull away, escape that hand coming ever closer, but even that is too much now. So he just lets it happen.

 

Atem’s hand is warm, alive, but not soft like he thought it would be. Too many battles fought, too many years spent with a sword in his hand.

 

„Kaiba, what have you done?“, he finally asks.

 

His voice is small, and indefinitely sad, horribly different to the regal way he still holds himself.

 

Kaiba opens his mouth to explain himself, indignity already rising in him, but no words come out.

 

He thinks of Mokuba instead, his tear strained face. Begging him not to go, not to leave him alone. His own voice soothing, reassuring for once in his life.

 

_You don’t need me anymore,_ he had said, the lie bitter in his mouth. He doesn’t even know who it was meant for anymore. He brother had put on a brave face, as always, but right now with the thing he wanted more than anything mere inches away from him he wonders if he might not have made a mistake.

 

Then Atem’s other hand reaches for his face, his palm glowing with the faint golden light Kaiba used to know from the puzzle. And suddenly his fears are gone. The pain goes with them.

 

Atem still looks sad on his behalf, but it softens into something else when Kaiba finally finds the strength to wrap his arms around him.

 

It feels familiar and strange at the same time, but he does not dwell on it too much. It is what he came for, after all.


End file.
